I thought I would tell about what I have been doing, lately, since, several important changes have taken place in my life with my art. For starters, I have joined 4 of Sebastian’s groups: Photoshop Artistry, AWAKE, Kaizen and 21 Days to Creative Abundance. Whereas the first and the last are more for individual help, the middle two are more about creating amazing art. There are some fabulous artists in these groups! I will tell about them at another time, though.

A while back, Teddi Rutschman, aka: FoxeySquirrel, who I have been friends with, online, for years, asked if I would be on her Creative Team. Well, she didn’t have to ask twice! I have so enjoyed playing with Teddi’s wonderful ‘ladies’ and textures and I love the ways in which she adorns her characters! Teddi is definitely one of a kind! I love her things! But, more than that, the time I spend playing with Teddi’s goodies, is more practice I get in. As it so turns out, too, many of my fellow artists use a lot of Teddi’s kits, as well as, other digi-scrapbooking kits and supplies. So, I see lots of different artist’s takes with Teddi’s things. Quite inspiring!

A few years ago, when I sort of resigned from scrapping, I was intent on creating artsy resources, which I did, but, more in a personal use way. I was leaving digi-scrapping behind! Then, I started to find digital scrapbooking folks who are getting in to an artsy-style of scrapbooking kits. I got to learn more techniques and practiced quite a bit this way! Like with Christine-Art’s hand-painted kits, as well. Putting together a set of specific elements and backgrounds, like what comes in a kit, can be quite challenging, but, fun! Great for practicing digital art!

Some of my favorite digi-scrap designers have moved to, or have added on, creating artsy kits. Magical Reality Designs has some fantastic artsy kits with Artistic Licensing available! I also noticed Kaklei Designs’ Karen Kleiman has been doing more and more artsy-style kits! Which is awesome because I won a place as a temporary Creative Team member in a contest of Karen’s recently! LOL

Karen invited me to participate in the challenge, so, I made my two layouts. There were 14 entrants, including me. This is the final layout of mine up for which everyone voted on.

I didn’t win First Place. In fact, there was a tie for First! I did place second, although, as with First, I placed in a tie for Second Place. I was extremely surprised! It is a 3-month Guest Designer position! I don’t particularly think of my art as dig-scrapping, but, it is very similar. I use an Envato Elements‘ photo and I am good to go! And, look at the beautiful colors and goodies in the kit from Karen, “Kindness”, now available.

The hardest thing for me to do is to post my art. I don’t know. I guess I don’t want to know what people think, so, I don’t go there. Lately, say, in the past 6 months, though, I have been somewhat more brave about it. I mostly post my images in my Behance Gallery. However, Brooke Shaden, of Promoting Passion, had an online “15 Day Creative Content Challenge”, back in August. For 15 days, following an exercise with Brooke each day, we were to create a layout. Brooke is noted for taking her own shots, mostly of herself, and using them in unusual ways for some of the greatest digital art online! It was necessary to post our daily layouts each day. Although, I did not snap any shots of myself to use, I did post each day’s image in my Behance Gallery for the Challenge. So, I got a little more used to putting my art ‘out there’. Since then, I have also posted more of my art in my groups, like AWAKE, Kaizen and Photoshop Artistry. The next step? Having my work published!

So, I create art and have joined some CT’s and get to practice! I just love art! And, that is me, lately!

This evening, I played in Photoshop with Teddi’s kits (aka: FoxeySquirrel). She just released 5 (that’s five!) new sets of goodies to her Scrapbook Graphics shop. (See note at bottom of page.)

I wanted to use a rather soft colorful background with a bold, dark ‘lady’. The lady is from “Wrinkly“, and the background from “Abstract Backgrounds”, both from FoxeySquirrel. The lady was too dark for the ‘Abstract Background’ I used. I thought about re-coloring the lady, but, that wouldn’t have looked right. Then, I recalled a technique in Photoshop, where you can take the colors from one photo and apply them to another. MATCH COLORS! Aha!

Here are the two images in Photoshop:

So, I opened the background and the lady in PS, each in their own doc (image above). They DO have to both be open in PS. The images DO NOT have to both be visible; they can be in different ‘Tabs’. You only have to see the one you wish to recolor. The two images also need to be close to the same size. I selected the lady image by clicking on it. Then, went to ‘Image’>’Adjustments’>’Match Color’. In the pop up box, look for the ‘Source’ image (2/3 way down the box) to ‘take’ the colors from. (See larger Color Match box image, below) In my case, I clicked on ‘Source’, then, from the list, selected the ‘other’ image, the background. It is in the little box now as, ‘FS_Abstract_Background_9’.

As soon as I clicked, and hit okay, the lady took on the coloring of my background! They look so much nicer together!

If you look at the ‘Color Match’ pop up box, there are adjustment sliders you can tweek the Intensity, Luminescence and Fade, so, fiddle with those to get the best color match you like!

When I last posted, regularly, on this blog, I was doing the scrapbooking thing, but, making the transfer over to art journaling. I wanted to create and use things that looked artistic. I made some resources of my own to use, which I have been threatening to post for all, but, have not got to it, yet. I am currently working on gathering all my goodies from all the different host sites and putting them all in one place. I will have a page where these items can be downloaded for free. I will let you know when, so, sign up for e-mail updates in the right side bar.

One of the first ‘artsy’ designers to catch my eye was Christine, of Les Idees de Christine. Chris hand paints her pretties. Her little daughter, the apple of her eye, even gets in on it with her own line of scrapbooking good called, “The World of Justine”. Creating a cool layout is so fun with handmade elements! Well, now Christine has opened a new blog/shop, Christine-Art. She offers tutorials, freebies and previews of her work.

A few months ago, Christine came out with a lovely collection of her art, Christine-Art Dreams of Light-1. It was such a fun kit, I ended up making several layouts with it and posting them in Christine’s FB group. Yesterday, she told me she had posted a page on her blog of my layouts. (She had asked for permission prior)

I hope you like and, there are a lot more! My Behance Gallery is coming along nicely. With being a part of Design Cuts and enrolled in Awake, my art is starting to look like something worth looking at! I’m having fun and I need it! LOL

I wanted to share this with you as it is so flattering to have the designer of a kit post your layouts and I’m not even a CT member. Her CT girls are absolutely phenomenal!